catie beck, thank you for the reporting you have done over the last several days. that closes out this busy hour for mow. i'll be see you at 11:00 p.m. eastern today. you can see me on snapchat and particularly pornd -- important with all the news we are getting. "deadline: white house" starts right now. hello, everybody. it is 4:00. i'm john heilemann filling in for nicolle wallace who let me here despite there's a 30% chance i'll burn the show to the ground in her absence. we are watching the east room where president trump will hold a news conference with the president of finland. this is the first time making remarks, and picturing pouring in from houston should be the somber back drop. the president tweeted messages of encouragement throughout the weekend to millions of people feeling the effects of hurricane

harvey. the latest -- quote, historic rainfall in houston and all over texas. floods are unprecedented and more rain coming. spirit of the people is incredible. thanks. trump trampling over that message, launching distracting moves from the white house late friday night as harvey began to hit the coast. following through on pardoning sheriff arpaio, condemned from "the wall street journal" and john mccain and paul ryan and the president barring the acceptance of transgender people in the military and also, the ousting of sebastian gorka. president trump and the first lady are expected to see the devastation of hurricane harvey and looming over this, more headlines about the trump campaign and the ties to russia. let's go to our reports covering all this stuff, peter alexander

at the white house, phil rucker from "the washington post" and nbc news national reporter and peter alexander, as a fellow northern wild cat, that's how we start it off as always, the president is headed down to houston, maybe on wednesday. what are you hearing about that? >> yeah. we're hearing that he's headed down tomorrow to texas and he's likely to go closer to corpus christi where hurricane harvey made landfall. governor abbott of texas saying that the president -- as he understands it, didn't want to go so those to houston that he didn't want to interrupt the evacuations still taking place and the president as me said in the oval office with the president of finland saying he'll visit more than one spot tomorrow in texas. departing early in the morning alongside his wife, melania trump, and he may go back this weekend with potential stops in louisiana and texas.

here's part of the president's remarks just a short time ago in the oval office. take a listen. >> the people are handling it amazingly well and the people of texas as you know have really persevered and when you watch the spirit and the enthusiasm and helping each other, the team work, it's really been something for people to say -- i think in finland they would say it's pretty incredible what they're able to do. >> we have noticed that, yes. >> so we'll be leaving tomorrow at 8:30 in the morning. >> president trump facing his first sort of commander in chief moment as it regards to a natural disaster. and governor abbott of course a republican from texas saying that the effort so far has been a-plus. praising the president all the way down. the president hoping to keep up that goodwill and demonstrate real competence by this administration in the days ahead. >> pete. phil rucker, let's ask about the other big story, one of them

over the weekend the arpaio pardon. sort of came out on friday as the story is about the hurricane were basically taking over all of cable news. there's suspicion on some people's part they were trying to bury this story. what are you hearing about that? >> the pardon of sheriff arpaio, is something that he has been wanting to be do. the president actually asked the attorney general, jeff sessions, back last spring whether it would be possible for the federal government to drop the criminal charges against arpaio, drop the case if you will. this was before the trial. he was advised that that would be inappropriate and so the president decided to let the trial to go forward and pardon him if he were found guilty which is what happened on july 31st. in the week since then, the wheels were turning at the white house to get this pardon ready to get the paperwork prepared to

get the talking points drafted and the president decided to execute the pardon on friday. it was in the middle of this hurricane but it was his decision. something he wanted to do. he signed a document, got it e-mailed over to arpaio's lawyer and by friday evening he felt like he was a free man. >> so the case of arpaio has been an ally of trump, dating back to the early days of the birther campaign. is this a personal loyalty that trump has to arpaio or thinking about that arpaio might run for senate against jeff flake. or what's the deeper motivation? >> these two men have known each other for five years. they were both pursuing the birther conspiracy investigations concurrently at the same time around 2011 and 2012. this was the false conspiracy into president obama's birth which as we know was in hawaii. and in arpaio, trump saw an

avatar. and he admired a that. he flattered arpaio and then they became friends and then last year on the campaign trail, arpaio was a surrogate. arpaio is 85 years old, he has health problems. he couldn't stomach the law and order icon, someone who served in the military, who has been a beat cop, someone like that to waste away in the jail cell and the president didn't want him to face jail crime. >> all right. you have some reporting in the paper in, the "wall street journal" just on where things stand on the -- on nbc, i'm thinking of your prior employer. over the mueller investigation that got overlooked in some of the coverage of all this

hurricane harvey material. tell us -- brief us on things in muellerville right now. >> sure. our reporting was on the new subpoenas that went out last week. basically there -- that mueller has subpoenaed six pr firms in washington, d.c., that did work with paul manafort on -- in a lobbying effort. international lobbying effort, basically. the stated purpose for this it was for ukraine's bid to enter the european union. the subpoenas that are now they had subpoenaed documents. these are for grand jury testimony which is a significant step in the investigation and is obviously serious and suggests that things are moving quick -- moving forward in terms of the investigation into paul manafort and the back drop is this against -- against this is that mueller is trying to figure out sort of whether these lobbying effort that paul manafort did with russian backed interests

were indeed on the level. whether the money that he received was -- that everything was as it should have been and as it presented. so this is just another indication that this investigation is moving forward. >> carol, do you have any sense -- the screws seem to be tightening every day on paul manafort. do you have any sense of how the manafort camp is feeling after it tightens? >> they have been defensive about this and the investigation. it is hard to get a real sense of exactly how they're feeling. there's obviously speculation about whether paul manafort will decide to cut some sort of deal or talk in terms of -- give up information that investigators are looking for elsewhere in exchange for something else. you know, if -- just in terms of where this investigation is going, you know, investigators are very much still focused on him. these subpoenas in particular suggest that things are -- that

it's -- things are heating up for him. >> phil, i want to ask you again and bring you back in here and you more about the mueller investigation and about in particular some reporting that first appeared in your paper, has been matched ant built on in "the new york times" about e-mails going back and forth between felix saider a long time trump associate and his personal lawyer. i'll read you one of the things, an e-mail that quotes saider saying to cohen in the fall of 2015, our boy can become president of the usa and we'll engineer it. i'll get putin's team to buy in on this. i will manage this process. now i don't nobody about you there's an awful lot about that -- some people said is collusion. talk about this story a little bit and what the implications of it are. >> yeah. well this is really significant. this reporting, there are a

number of stories over the last 24 hours or so. it shows that the trump organization, donald trump's real estate business was actively pursuing a deal in moscow for a massive trump tower project during the campaign. we all remember then candidate donald trump and he's repeated this line as president insisting he had no deals in russia, no interests in russia. that there's just no there-there. it turns out there was a deal in the works, something that the trump organization was trying to build. michael cohen, the executive at the trump organization and the lawyer there, he's also very close to president donald trump. he's a central figure here. there's actually an e-mail that he sent to the spokesman for vladimir putin in january of 2016 that my colleagues reported on just in the last hour or two. where he's asking for help from the putin government. this doesn't mean that there's any collusion necessarily with the campaign but it certainly

raises a big red flag i think for the mueller probe as they're trying to investigate any and all contacts, connections, ties, between the trump orbit if you will, meaning the campaign and the business and russia. >> right. at a minimum it kind of pushes up against trump's insistence, that there are relevant events that took place that extend far back behind the campaign proper. i want to bring you back to the story that should be dominating our day, the hurricane harvey. there are federal and state responses going on but focus just on the president over the course of the weekend and what we are to make of the responses that he put out mostly over twitter and many of them seemingly appropriate to almost everyone. some of them seeming less appropriate to many. what do we make of his behavior on his favorite machine over the

last 72 hours? >> it's objectively clear that he's not focused only on hurricane harvey and the people we know who have died in the storm. on friday night we had the pardoning of sheriff arpaio, we had the transgender military ban coming up, and gorka quitting and he's been -- he's been asking people to buy sheriff clarke's book and going to visit missouri. he's doing all this other stiff and i'm sure the people who voted for him are facing the historic flooding in houston. in some ways we see a president who can't focus on a natural disaster. i just was reporting in galveston, texas, and my story was focused on climate change and on the idea that middle class and poor people would be some of the first people hurt by climate change and there's this idea that these storms, these hurricanes are getting worse and worse and that working class and

poor people that voted for president trump, thought his presidency would improve his lives, they can't afford to get into their car and drive four or five hours or can't afford a hotel room to try to escape the floods. so people are stuck in their homes and hurt by the storms. people are really looking for a president that is focused on they want, focused on their well-being. we'll see in the press conference that's going to come if he'll change his tune or sound more sincere. >> thank you very much. we'll be going to that press conference live as soon as it begins. thank you to carol and phil rucker and peter alexander. talk to you later on in the show. let's bring in the panel. msnbc political analyst peggy noonan. and mark barnacle. and the great lawrence o'donnell. great to see you.

i want to just take a first big swing at this. trump has had crises, some self-inflicted. some not so self-inflicted. this is a particular category of challenge that the president faces when lives are lost, or when the resources need to be marshalled. how do you think he's doing? >> it's early. this is a catastrophe that is going to be a rolling one that takes place over the next few weeks. it has been going on in the past few days. every level of government going to be challenged by it. everyone i think in politics right now is speaking of good coordination between the federal, the state, the city and the national guard, et cetera. so it looks okay. but i don't think that's the story. i think the story is what's happening to those poor people in houston. >> it is obviously a huge

humanitarian climatological event. and being the devil's advocate does it matter what donald trump says about this? if it's handled well on the ground, does it matter whether he's tweeting mildly or severely inappropriate things over the weekend? >> to my mind and to other people the first -- the last couple of days were a collision of contrasts. you had the president of the united states tweeting in a self-absorbed way. you had general mattis the secretary of defense standing in front of the troops in iraq, talking about this country and the fact that the country is hurt right now. and he knows it's hurt but we'll come back. talking about inspiration. that's leadership. leadership is not something you go out and acquire. you don't buy it. it's a skill set. self-involvement, self-absorption is not something you can just put on the shelf.

if it's part of you. and in the middle of all of this, we have a tribe, a nation of people called americans in houston. leaning towards one another, helping one another. there's darkness in our politics right now, but the leadership, the skill set that's not coming out of washington, it's coming out of houston and we're watching it. >> so you raise the mattis remarks. let's put them on so people can see what you're talking about, mike. >> you're a great example for our country right now. it's got some problems, you know it and i know it. what we don't have in the military, and you just hold the line, my fine soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines. hold the line until our country gets back to understanding and respecting each other and showing it and being friendly to one another.

you know, what the americans owe to one another we're so dog gone lucky to be americans. >> lawrence, watching that, the defense secretary universally respected and admired. for many people they look at him and think he's a bulwark against potential trump deprivations of various kinds. people see him as a symbol of hope. when donald trump watches that video what do you think he thinks? >> what everyone in the media has been saying they see -- a sharp disagreement with the president. to take the words from the defense secretary in history. you can say he's in obvious disagreement, people should respect each other. we know the president is not in favor of that so that very innocent collection of words represents instantly to many people's minds a sharp disagreement with the president. i'd be interested to see what the president thinks about it.

>> reutimann, you have twitter jacked in through iv so you're watching trump tweet all weekend long. what do you think the media would say about his tweeting all weekend long? >> we saw what the media said, look at this, look at this, oh, my god. all that -- the thing that matters the most are people are safe and taken care of, yes. but i think this was coming -- what struck everyone was this was coming after a week we had two speeches that were in deep contrast from president trump last week. one was let's bring the country together. one was the -- that situation in phoenix that a single word can't describe. so it was the substantively, it was different. so here is a chance to bring together the country for the fellow americans who are suffering and in great danger. it was the opportunity he got distracted into look what this

division -- he just tweeted. >> peggy, you raised a really vital point on this. this going to extend out. it's not just the next few days but then it gets to governance. two of the most important agencies involved in houston now and in the -- maybe for the next year, hud, ben carson's hud, and the epa. scott pruitt's epa. i mean, the government large parts of it, i'm not an expert on it. but people say are -- top level government posts have a lot of mediocre people running then and the function of government it better perform in houston. >> and a they have a lot of empty desks also. >> yeah. >> and there's a lot of people who aren't even there. it's understaffed all of it top to bottom. >> and there's three months at least in the hurricane season. >> it's astonishing to see how many unfilled jobs there are still. you wonder if they'll ever be

filled. your view is that's okay. >> sometimes it's better to have an empty desk than some of the people that donald trump wanted to put at the desks. >> can i say i thought one of the things most interesting about what general mattis said in think in jordan and it keys off of what lawrence said, mattis was making a clear distinction between these fabulous young men and women arrayed before him from america and he seemed to be saying, back in washington, they can't get it together. it did seem implicitly to be a critique for he is a major washington player himself. >> okay. this table, you all are staying here now and i'm throwing to hans nichols in the east room of the white house. because the president is about to come out. hans, what is happening with you? >> john, good afternoon to you. i think we're getting the president of the united states here shortly. i'm going to have a seat. he's coming to the podium. >> thank you. thank you very much.

it is my great honor to welcome the president to the white house. we have just concluded a very positive meeting and i want to begin today by extending my thoughts and prayers for those affected by hurricane harvey. and the catastrophe of flooding and all of the other difficulties that they're currently going through in houston. in southeast texas, and now it's looking more and more like the state of louisiana will be also affected. my administration is coordinating closely with state and local authorities in texas and in louisiana to save lives and we thank our first responders and all of those involved in their efforts. we're working directly with texas governor greg abbott who by the way is doing a fantastic

job. and his entire staff likewise. as well as with governor john bel edwards who's very much involved in starting the process of louisiana. we have pledged our full support as texas and louisiana battle and recover from this very devastating and historic storm. there's probably never been anything like this. under the supervision of fema, administrator brock long, there has been a tremendous amount of work done. he has been so outstanding in so many ways. more than 8,500 federal workers are involved in the texas effort alone. i have also today declared emergencies in louisiana at the request of governor edwards. recovery will be a long and difficult road and the federal

government stands ready, willing and able to support that effort. right now the single most important thing is the safety and security of those still in harm's way. including the first responders who have been so terrific and brave. protecting the lives of our people is my highest priority. every asset at my command is at the disposal of local officials. tragic times such as these bring out the best in america's character, strength, charity and resilience are those characters. we see neighbor helping neighbor. friend helping friend and stranger helping stranger. you see that all over. you watch on television, you just see such incredible work and love and team work. we are one american family, we

hurt together, we struggle together and believe me we endure together. we are one family. to the people of texas, and louisiana, we are 100% with you. we're praying for you, we're working closely with your leaders and officials. and i will be visiting the impact zone tomorrow to ensure that you're receiving full support and cooperation from the federal government and on saturday, we think we're going back to texas and also we will be going to louisiana. nothing can defeat the unbreakable spirit of people of texas and louisiana. right now every american heart sends its love and support to those whose lives have been totally up ended. totally by this very horrible storm. we ask god for his wisdom and strength. we will get through this, we will come out stronger.

and believe me we will be bigger, better, stronger than ever before. the rebuilding will begin and in the end, it will be something very special. i just want to thank everybody in the affected area because it has been absolutely incredible to watch the spirit, the cooperation and the love. i would also like to share a message to the people of finland. who have recently suffered a terrorist attack in terku. we stand in solidarity with you against the terrorist threat and we must deny terrorists safe havens, cut off their finances. mr. president, americans are grateful for your steadfast support as an ally. in the fight against terrorism. appreciate it. including your membership in the coalition to defeat isis.

finland makes important contributions to the coalition and its effort in afghanistan and has troops on the ground in iraq, training iraqi soldiers. in afghanistan, finland provides troops and financial contributions to support the afghan national defense and security forces on a modern day frontier between barberism and civilization. that's what you have, is barberism versus civilization. we are particularly grateful to the finnish citizens who have sacrificed for our mutual security. finland is a leading expert in cyber security. in fact, we should be calling you pretty soon. you do a fantastic job with cyber security and i congratulate you and i think in a very short period of time we'll be right there with you. believe me. the united states is very proud partner of finland's european

center of excellence to counter modern threats including cyber attacks. in addition, we look forward to your leadership as chair of the arctic council. the arctic region has strategic and economic importance for both of our nations. very much so. the foundation of our friendship is our shared love of freedom. on behalf of all americans i congratulate you and the finnish people on the 100th anniversary of finland's independence. 100 years. it's fantastic. in honor of finland's centennial, the united states is contributing an additional half million dollars to the fulbright finland foundation. through the fulbright program we are sending more of our best and brightest to finland, forging lasting impressions between americans and finns. on the economic front we seek

fair and recip roqual trade and i applaud to increasing the technology and adding good jobs for hard working americans. thank you. the u.s./finnish partnership is rooted in our shared interests and common values. as president and i must say i want to thank you, president, we have discussed and we look forward to further strengthening these bonds of culture, commerce and cooperation between the two countries so that our citizens and our nations can thrive and prosper together. mr. president, i'd like to thank you very much for being at the white house and we had a great meeting in the oval office. it's my honor to have you here. thank you. thank you. >> mr. president, i want to thank you for your very kind words and i just want to tell

you that it is a great pleasure and honor to be here today. i thank you also for the discussions we have had today. they have been of the most interest. we have been closely following hurricane harvey. our thoughts are with the people of texas and to louisiana. they and you, mr. president, have shown strength and courage to overcome this catastrophe. it has been touching to watch the tv and see how people help each other. that is what we basically are built of. helping each other. finland highly appreciates our close relationship with the united states.

today, they are ranging from the security to the defense operation to trade and innovation. we are indeed celebrating our 100 years of independence. i want to thank you for the generous gift presented to the fulbright finland foundation. i want to also to take this opportunity to create the almost 700,000 americans who have finnish origin. mr. president, we exchanged information on several international issues. our headline was security. we talked about the importance of the transatlantic bond between the european union and the united states. history has taught us europeans the value of unity. the u.s. and nato presence in

europe are -- and in the baltic sea are most important and they are increasing rabidly. finland is doing its part. we promote dialogue to reduce risks finland has proposed steps to improve flight safety in the baltic sea area. they are small but positive steps in reopening dialogue between nato and russia. we remain committed to supporting afghanistan and we are dedicated member of the global coalition against isis. finland took the chairman seat of the arctic council from the united states in may. we can't afford losing the pristine arctic nature and finland firmly believes that business and environment can both be winners in the arctic.

a good example is reducing black carbon. mr. president, i'm looking forward to even closer cooperation with you and your great nation. i want to thank you. >> thank you. >> so we'll take a couple of questions. how about we go to texas. todd gilman, todd? >> thank you, mr. president. >> yes. >> i'm wondering what you can tell the people of texas to expect in terms of long term recovery efforts and in particular you have been feuding with some key congressional leaders. you have also threatened a government shutdown potentially next month over border wall funding. are these going to hamper long term the funding that will be needed long term for recovery? >> no, todd. i think you'll see very rapid action from congress, certainly from the president. and you're going to get your

funding. it's a terrible tragedy. your governor has been absolutely outstanding in the job he's done, and his entire staff and i will say that -- i just spoke with greg and he is working like 24/7. we expect to have requests on our desk fairly soon and we expect that congress will feel very much the way i feel. in a very bipartisan way that will be nice. but we think you'll have what you need and it will go fast. texas is a unique place. it's great, great state. great people. and i think you'll be up and running very, very quickly. really very quickly. so yeah, i think you'll be in fantastic shape. i have already spoken to congress and everybody feels for you and feels for what you're going through. but at the same time, they have great respect. even additional respect for the state because you have had handled it so well and brilliantly. but it's a long road, still

pouring. no one has ever seen anything like it. i have heard the words epic and historic, that's what it is. but you'll have what you want very, very quickly. and todd, you can ask a question to the president. >> does this situation make you reconsider the possibility of a government shutdown? >> it has nothing to do with it. i think this is separate. this is going to go really very, very quickly. again i have spoken to many of the people we're talking about. and everybody feels the same way i do. >> thank you. and mr. president, i wanted to ask you, your neighbor russia has meddled in u.s. politics. they have a military exercise coming up in the next few weeks. in the baltic there are tensions over there. what kind of advice have you offered and can you offer to the united states in dealing with this adversary? >> sir, we are not feeling ourselves as advisers but we are fielding ourselves as doing all

what is possible to maintain peace and that is what we are doing in baltic sea area too. with the actually -- you referred to the different part of the military training which is -- which is going to happen there. i have to tell you that a couple of weeks ago i met president putin. and the media are very interested in why chinese navy's having a training together with russians in baltic sea area. putin answered that it is not against anybody. my answer was that we are also training in baltic sea. we, the united states and sweden and it is not a block, it is not against anybody. so we have to be very careful

about the huge training, huge military trafficking over baltic. that it doesn't cause any accidental problems because we know that from accidents might grow whatever. and that is why i think it's important that we continue to work with nato to enhance like i said dialogue between russia and nato and it is going forward. >> you have a question? >> finnish broadcasting company where you are. okay. >> thank you, mr. president. i have a question to president trump if i may. as the president told he's been raising the issue about the security situation in the baltic region and the sea specifically and has been concerned about the

russian planes flying there without transponders on. my question to you, mr. president, would be mr. president trump, would you consider russia as a security threat? thank you. >> well, i many countries a security threat unfortunately when you look at what's going on in the world today. as you know a few weeks ago our great vice president, mike pence, who is right here, he was in the region and he spent quite a bit of time there. we consider that a very, very important part of the world. we have great relationships there. we have a great relationship with finland. and so i would consider many countries threats but these are threats we can handle if we have to. hopefully we don't have to handle it, but we'll handle it. >> i have a follow-up. if the situation in the baltic were to escalate what would the u.s. be ready to do in that unfortunate circumstances?

>> well, we are protective of that region. we are very, very protective. we have great friends there, we are extremely protective. thank you. a question for the president. yes. >> sometimes -- >> do you have a question for the president? do you have a question for the president? >> you don't have to. >> mr. presidents, i'm from finland. did you speak speak about climate change at all, and what about your initiative about cleaning up the arctic and doing it together with the united states? what kind of response did your idea receive here in washington, d.c.? >> we discussed a lot about black carbon. and to explain to everybody, what happens is that from the

atmosphere black carbon covers the arctic and we know what happens when the sunshine meets black. it melts the ice. and the problem is not only arctic. if we lose the arctic, we lose the globe. that is a reality. we must fight against those emissions spreading the black carbon. i understand that the united states is going to put in half and we know that black carbon sources are a lot of them are in russia. they are old fashioned energy plants. they're producing heating. the other problem is flaring. you know, that -- you know, in oil fields they flare up, and the amount is huge yearly.

they flare 40 times more than finland has spent. so if we can -- and here comes our business, it would be a good business to renew those old fashioned plants, to make more with less energy. it would be a business to stop flaring, to take use of that gas which has now burned and i think that these elements are things that we can continue discussing in the arctic council. we have inherited the chairmanship from the united states and we continue the work. >> we had a very good discussion in particular on the arctic and black carbon. and i think we have much in agreement. one of the things we also agree on, we want crystal clean water and we want clean air.

the cleanest ever. very important. so we have a lot of agreement. john roberts? >> mr. president, thank you so much. i have a question for you as well, but if i can start with president trump, in the middle of hurricane harvey hitting on friday night you chose to pardon former sheriff joe arpaio. i wonder if you can tell us what was behind your thinking for issuing a pardon for the sheriff and what do you say to your critics even in some of your own party who say that was the wrong thing to do? >> well, a lot of people think it was the right thing to do john. actually in the middle of the hurricane, i assumed the ratings would be far higher, you know, the hurricane was just starting, and i put it out that i had pardoned sheriff joe.

he's done a great job for the people of arizona. he's strong on borders and strong on illegal immigration. he is loved in arizona and i thought he was treated unbelievably unfairly when they decided to go get him right before the election voting started as you know and he lost in a fairly close election. he would have won the election but they hammered him before the election and i thought that was a very, very unfair thing to do. when i mentioned him the other night, the people went crazy, i said what do you think of sheriff joe or something to that effect and the place went crazy when i was in arizona last week. as far as pardons are concerned, i actually did this just before the -- i assumed that someone would ask me the question. i didn't know it would be you, but i thought i would. you know, sheriff joe is a great veteran of the military. great law enforcement person. somebody that's won many, many elections in the state of arizona.

but i wanted to look at some of the other people that were pardoned over the years. and if you look at as an example president clinton pardoned mark rich who was charged with crimes going back decades including illegally buying oil from iran while it held 53 american hostages. wasn't allowed to do that. selling to the enmys of the united states. he was pardoned after his wife donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to the clintons. then you have dangerous criminals, president clinton pardoned susan rosenberg, a member of the weather underground. charged as part of a bank robbery that led to a guard and two police officers being killed. drug dealers. president clinton commuted the sentence of carlos vignali in a cocaine ring that stretched from california to minnesota. criminal leaker, you have heard

the word leaker. president obama commuted the sentence of chelsea manning who leaked countless sensitive and classified documents to wikileaks, perhaps to others. but horrible, horrible thing that he did. commuted the sentence. and perhaps pardoned. president obama commuted the sentence of oscar lopez rivera who was charged as part of a violent independence group from puerto rico, responsible for 28 chicago area bombings and many deaths in the 1970s and 1980s. sheriff joe is a patriot. sheriff joe loves our country. sheriff joe protected our borders. and sheriff joe was very unfairly treated by the obama administration. especially right before an election. an election that he would have won. so -- and he was elected many times. so i stand by my pardon of

sheriff joe and i think the people of arizona who know him best would agree with me. thank you very much. >> mr. president, i'd like to claim prescience that you did all the research, but the question was fairly obvious. i'm sure the president briefed you today or aware of the new plan for afghanistan that relies at the core in bringing the taliban to the table for negotiations. given the history and the ideology of the taliban, do you ever believe that they would honor any kind of an agreement that was ever made or would they when the united states and finland and other countries leave afghanistan renege on that deal? >> yes, first of all, i want to underline that finland has been involved from the very beginning to all of the attempts to solve the situation in afghanistan. we have troops there.

we have also financial aid going on all the time. we have to try. we have to try in all possible ways to solve the situation in afghanistan. it has been ongoing quite a long time for decades. but to solve it by negotiations show that you have to have full respect to the one you negotiate or so fully believe that what is negotiated is also fulfilled. these elements has to be all the time present. when you discuss which ever party in afghanistan. >> i know there might be a couple more questions but do you want to take one more?

would you want to take one more? go ahead and pick. >> please. >> again? you're going to give her the same one. >> no, she's not to a same lady. >> go ahead. >> they are sitting side by side. >> we have a lot of blonde women in finland. >> go ahead. >> mr. president trump, what kind of role do you see us finland having in the u.s./russia relations? do you think that finland could be getting better relations with russia? >> i think it a good thing if we have great relationships or at least good relationships with russia. that's very important. and i believe some day that will happen. it's a big country, it's a nuclear country. it's a country that we should get along with and i think we will eventually get along with russia. finland has been free of russia just about one of the few countries in the region that has been for a hundred years and russia has a lot of respect for finland so that's a always good.

but i think finland is doing fine with russia. and i hope that the united states will some day be able to have a good very relationship with russia also. i think that's good for world peace and for other things. thank you. >> as a follow-up, if finland's relationship with russia were to deteriorate, would the u.s. -- what kind of assistance would the u.s. be willing to give to finland bilaterally if we needed it? >> well, as i said before, that you know our relationship with finland is a very close one. and we're always ready to help finland. one of the things that's happening is you're purchasing large amounts of our f-18 aircraft from boeing and it's one of the great planes, one of the great fighter jets and you're purchasing lots of other military equipment and i think purchasing very wisely. i know all of the military equipment and i actually agree with everything you've purchased. we talked about it before. i think finland is really a respected country militarily. it's got large armed forces for

its size as a country. really proportionally, one of the biggest in the world if you think of it. >> i think so. >> but they're respected militarily and respected beyond militarily so hopefully it will never come to that. thank you. >> did you discuss russia and did you offer any assistance to the u.s. with their relationship with russia? >> well, we -- like i said earlier on we did discuss about russia, but actually i don't feel myself or feel i'm not an adviser to everybody, but we tried to do our best and hopefully we get our results from that. i want to remind you that in nato meeting a year ago, approximately, it was stated by

all nato countries that with russia you have to be deterrents, you have to exercise dialogue too. these two elements have to be there. >> go ahead. >> thank you, mr. president. th. in the aftermath of hurricane harvey, do you believe that cutting fema's budget is the right thing to do? >> no. i think what's going to happen is the fema money is relatively small compared to the rebelieve money, so fema right now, we have the money necessary for texas and louisiana if we need. but the real number, which will be many billions of dollars, will go through congress. i think it will happen very quickly. it will go very fast, and i want to congratulate you on the network. it's a great network. >> thank you. if i may follow-up on one other question from earlier. >> yes. >> the southern border wall, is your plan still to have mexico pay for the wall. >> yes. one way or the other mexico is going to pay for the wall.

it may be through employee reimbursement. in my opinion mexico has been very difficult as they should be. why wouldn't they be? they had a sweetheart deal for them over many years. i guarantee, mr. president, finland would never have signed nafta with russia or whoever you wanted -- this is not a deal that you would want to sign. this is not a deal that finland would know r know about. nafta is one of the worst trade deals signed anytime. i understand why mexico is being difficult because why wouldn't they be? they've had it their way. mexico will pay for the wall it may be through reimbursement. mexico sincerely a tremendous crime problem, tremendous, one of the number two or three in the world. and that's another reason we need it. and the -- just to add on, tremendous drugs are pouring into the united states at levels that nobody has ever seen before. this happened over the last

three to four years in particular. the wall will stop much of the drugs from pouring into this country and poisoning our youth. so we need the wall. it's imperative. we may fund it through the united states, but ultimately mexico will pay for the wall. >> sir, if i may follow-up. on tuesday you said if we have to close down our government we are building that wall. if mexico is paying for the wall why would we close down our government? >> yeah. i hope that's not necessary. if it's necessary, we'll have to see, but i hope it's not necessary. the wall is needed from the standpoint of security. the wall is needed from the standpoint of drug tremendous -- the drug scourge, what's coming through that area through the areas that we're talking about. as you know, i have general kelly here. we talked traffic coming through 78%. it's going to be i think 81% this quarter, which is a record. in other administrations if they stopped it just a little bit, like one or two or three%, they

card that a great thing. we're up to almost 80%. we'll seen be over 80%. but you need the wall to do the rest. and you need the wall for the drugs. the drugs are a tremendous problem. the wall will greatly help with the drug problem. and ultimately that's a good thing for mexico also. we have a very good relationship with mexico, but i will say that dealing with them, i've always said i've talked about nafta you've heard me many times and i've said that we will either terminate it or renegotiate it. we're in the process of renegotiating right now the deal. i believe that you will probably have to the aleast start the termination process before a fair deal could be arrived at, because it's been a one-sided deal. ask this includes canada, by the way. great respect for canada, great love for canada, but it's been a one-sided deal for canada and for mexico. and the united states workers, all of these incredible people who have lost their jobs because of nafta, they're not going to

be suffering any longer. it's been unfair for too long. so we will build the wall and we will stop a lot of things, including the drugs that are pouring in at levels like nobody has ever seen. we'll be able to stop them once the wall is up. thank you very much. thank you. thank you, everybody. >> thank you. >> thank you. that was president donald j. trump at a press conference with the finish president on the table questions and related to black cash ons, the balk ins, sheriff joe arpaio, fema and the border wall. covered a lot of ground in a relatively short period of time. i know you have reactions and i want to know what they are but the first thing i heard you say is i noticed you were nodding your head vigorously when the president invoked the name of mark rich. >> pardon scandals live forever as the chin tons can tell you.

and this is one of the rare moments in which president trump was being generous in effect in the clinton's direction by mentioning only a couple of the pardons that bill clinton did on his final day in office. he pardoned 140 people on his final day in ofrls. some of them represented by hillary clinton's brother as the lawyer. this was as bad as it gets. >> many of them donors if i remember correctly. >> in american pardon history. until now this is a new version. this is a brand-new version. this is unlike anything that clinton did. all of those cases had gone through the judicial process. they were all at the end of the road. there was no other judicial process left, except for the mark rich piece, who had been -- he had been ae fugitive, so he had always evaded any prosecution. but that, that is the kind of thing that i have always run into talking to trump voters. when i was talking to trump voters during the campaign and i'd mention some lie, they would never fight. they'd never say it wasn't a lie.

they'd say they all lie. and then they would point to different things in the past that bill clinton lied about and, you know, the guy was found guilty of perjury, bill clinton was. what can you say. so this is the problem is that you leave these footprints behind that someone like this can come back and refer to and use to justify himself on what he did with arpaio. >> all right. hans nichols down in the east room. you were there. you witnessed that in person. what did you make of it and what do you think the big headlines were? >> well, president trump was clearly enjoying himself. but john, i think the headlines in some ways was about the border. this is a president who opened up the idea of having reimbursement by mexico saying the u.s. initially would pay. that sort of undercuts this whole notion that the debt ceiling and the government funding could be held hostage to the wall it seemed to me the president was negotiating in public a little bit there, at least on the payment for the wall. we also heard yet again more

embracing of what the president wants to do and what's happening in terms of recovery with the hurricane. this is clearly a president that is enjoying the crisis communications aspect of the job. and then finally, on the issue of joe arpaio, clearly the president was prepared, but his argument seemed to be in two-fold and really in some ways contradictory. in one hand he feels saying he's unimpeachable. he is a patriot he is beyond reproach and then he rolls out the list and the list has a bunch of other individuals who were less worthy of a pardon. so it's very difficult to make your argument saying the guy i pardoned was perfect and impeach alk and a patriot and at the same time saying others pardoned were much much worse. >> thank you very much. we have a couple minutes and i want to get around the table one more time before we have to go. peggy, arpaio, your paper's he had editorial board wrote a song -- this is a different kind of

thing. the sheriff was in violation of a court order telling him not to do something that was unconstitutional. >> yes. >> and that is the subject of this pardon that makes it a little different. what is your take on it now that you've heard trump's defense? >> my take on it at the moment, i agree with "the wall street journal" he had editorial just because i agree with it, but i have a feeling mr. trump just did himself some good speaking the way he did of it. also somebody noted joe arpaio was 85 years old. that will make people feel sympathetic. i'll tell you what i think was the headline on that news conference, the president seemed calm. he didn't seem wig gi, angry, rattled, excitable. he seemed sort of calm and sort of happy. sort of stable, which reminds us that the backdrop is a dreadful catastrophe in texas. he didn't make it worse by saying crazy things. forgive me.

>> stable is good. mike. >> well, joe arpaio is going to be interesting to see how the court system reacts to the pardon of joe ar pie he i don't. they are human beings, these judges and the president's pardon flountd his anger and his disrespect for the judiciary. but he did raise this and it was just a matter of time before it came up that scandal house day, no pun intended with 140 pardons and a healthy percentage of them outrageous by outgoing president clinton led by the mark rich pardon and president trump today gave himself a pretty healthy inknock lags against that. >> the but in it is that he said he announced the pardon during the hurricane because the ratings were good then. >> yes. >> so that to me was a little bit unexpected, shall we say. >> yes. i was not really trying to hide it because i knew the ratings would be great because the hurricane was happening. incredible. the media creditic as commander

in chief. >> and on this subject of pardons in the past, u to justify all of your own choices as president within their own realm. you don't get to say this is better than what someone else did in the past. so the reference to clinton is a political reference and unfortunately, it does have a real effect with voters. and we heard that real effect when we were talking to voters during the presidential campaign zbloor pardoning mr. arpaio sends a message that law enforcers can ignore court orders and get away with it. thank you for being here with me and that does it for this hour. "mtp daily" starts just a couple seconds late with katie tur in for chuck. >> good evening. president trump just wrapped up a joint press conference at the white house with the president of finland. it was the first time we've heard from him on camera since